Our Thanksgiving

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving yesterday. We sure did! John smoked our 1o pound turkey all morning, and I made the rest of the food. It was delicious, and we're still dining on leftovers.

On another note, here's a picture of the blueberry-pear tart I made Wednesday. The filling was delicious, but the crust had something to be desired. Anyone have a fail-proof recipe for crust that you'd like to share with me? I'd love to have some other options.

Drum Roll Please...

Just a quickie here...I'm very excited to announce.....drum roll, please...

William did his first sign last night!!! I've been trying to teach him "please" and "thank you" via signing, and last night he did it all by himself! I'm not very consistent with signing please and thank you, but I always say it to him...last night he copied me and signed thank you after he ate his food. And this morning he did please and thank you again! We're making progress!!

I'm so proud of him!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I Can't Help Myself...

This book was so much fun. I couldn't put it down. (Not because I could read the words, or anything...)

But I did. I had to. I was with my husband and son at my friend's house for a birthday party. I didn't want her to think I was a nerd.


Especially since I was taking self portraits of my face in a pig's body.




And rooster's.

Oh, I crack myself up sometimes!

Brisket

I know this isn't a food blog, but I just had to share the wonderful brisket my husband made this past Tuesday. He got the recipe from a grilling cookbook, so I won't reprint it here.



Oh man! The meat was smoked for over 6 hours, and boy, was it worth it! The potatoes (obviously not shown) were also smoked, for about 5 hours. They, too, were done to perfection!




I don't think words have been invented to describe the incredible goodness shown in this picture.

Shorter Hikes Here We Come!

John had today off, (tomorrow too! Yeah!) so we decided that we'd have a leisurely "family fun" day by biking/rollerblading in the morning, and hiking the Mentryville trail in the afternoon.

With William's help John pumped up his bike tires and my jogger tires. We ended up going several miles on the trails around our home. Since rollerblading and pushing a jogger is much more work than biking (in my opinion) and since there are lots of hills where we live I was exhausted by the time we got home. I've been keeping my eyes open for a bike trailer/bike seat either second hand through zwaggle/freepeats/Play It Again Sports or a good deal through a store. If any of you see anything let me know!


After William's nap we headed out to In 'N Out for burgers and a shake. William has found that he loves french fries and strawberry shakes! He's never been able to get anything to come out of a straw, but once we put the shake up to his mouth he "magically" figured it out!

Then we headed for the hiking trails! Wait for us William! (He was a little eager to get started.)


John lugged William on his back for several miles before we turned around. I was not thinking, and didn't bring William's sippy of milk. He started fussing a little, and we decided that short hiking trips are what we're going to be doing for awhile!


We all had a wonderful time! It was a great leisurely "family fun" day!

Hold On While I Fix My Cape

Today was one of those days where I needed to schedule in breathing time.

From the moment I got up I was go-go-go. For the record it seems that some nights I don't get any sleep. Last night William woke up around 1am and refused to go back to sleep unless I nursed him. I complied. Then I tried to go back to sleep, but since John was pulling an "all nighter" with his school work I had a hard time sleeping. 4am John started getting ready for work, and I woke up for that. 6:30 my alarm went off. Yeah...I didn't get much sleep.

I did accomplish a lot, though. Post office, mopped floor, cleaned bathrooms, vacuumed, tutored 3 kids all afternoon. Not to mention I have a very active (and headstrong!) little tot under my feet!

I'm trying to get my "chores" assigned to a certain day, so that the vacuuming gets done on a particular day, bathrooms get cleaned on another, etc. but I'm having a hard time doing so. Life just seems to get in the way.

Do any of you have a specific way you get everything accomplished in your week? I'd love to hear any suggestions.

Anyway, my cape has been fluttering all day, and now that I've been sitting here awhile it's getting quite wrinkled. I'll be needing it tomorrow, so I'd best go hang it up for the night.

Have a good one!

~The Mamma

Pears In The Armpits

Yes, you read that right. (If you enlarge the photo you can see pears that go all the way up his arm! He's eating fresh pears now, not pureed. He practically squashes them to pieces when he picks them up, though.)


Anyway...William has been getting very picky with his eating lately. He simply doesn't want to eat like a big boy anymore. He'll eat, but only little bits. All he really wants is milk. milk. milk. He fusses, he squirms, he yells. It's all driving me nuts and I don't know what to do about it.

He has always been a perfect eater, eating everything I place in front of him or place in his mouth for him. Now, it's like he's entering the Terrible Twos and has to protest every. little. thing.

I tried something different the other day. I let him hold his own spoon and "feed" himself. It was extremely messy, but it did the trick. That was exactly what he wanted.


I promptly went out and bought a carpet protector!

When You Run Out Of Candidates...

...always vote your conscience!




I hope he's not too upset if his choice for President doesn't garner enough votes to make it to the White House.
I think he'll get over it!

I Think You Get The Picture

Just a little note I found on the grass here in our neighborhood while taking William for a walk. It's pretty self-explanatory.

Nursery

This morning we left William in the nursery, since of the three of us he's the only one who's healthy. We thought that sitting in the well-baby cry room would not have been good, even though the "baby" is well.

We dropped him off and left quickly, so I couldn't see the alligator tears that I'm sure poured out. I left explicit instructions for the attendants to page me if he was crying more than 10 minutes. (They've let him cry for a looong time in the past, and that just upset me.)

I completely expected to be paged during the service, but none came. :-)

When we went back to the nursery to pick him up a nice girl was holding him (of course!) and he was tear-free. The moment he saw us he started to cry, giving us me the guilt trip. The girl assured me that he hadn't cried (really) and had played with the toys.

It was great being able to get a few moments away, and to enjoy a great sermon.

Time Lapse...

William was given this costume last year. Back then I could hardly believe that he'd be big enough to wear it, and, well....he's still not quite big enough, but it fits him fairly well. He thought it was pretty cool, and tramped around upstairs like a little cub.

Since he's still not feeling well, after a few minutes of being a tiger he got thoroughly bored of the activity. And he let me know it.



Sort of reminds me of last year...